God Is Red: A Native View of Religion

Deloria uses “Indian” and “tribal” to stress community-defined peoples with specific lands, ceremonies, and kinship, not an abstract religious “universal.” He shows how federal roll-making and blood-quantum rules distorted who counts as a member, undermining the organic link between peoplehood, sacred places, and governance.

Indigenous denotes a broader global category for original peoples whose identities are rooted in particular homelands and ceremonial relationships to them. In the book’s terms, Indigenous perspectives highlight land-based religion and communal responsibility, standing against Christian universalism and corporate/state control of territory.

A medicine bag is a personal sacred bundle carrying powerful objects, prayers, or medicines. On a communal scale, Deloria discusses how medicine bags are central to tribal religious life. He laments how many were taken into museums during suppression; reclaiming them is part of reviving ceremonies and restoring a living connection to place and ancestors.

The National Congress of American Indians is the principal intertribal advocacy organization for treaty rights, self-determination, and policy reform. While the book focuses on local councils and movements, NCAI embodies the political front Deloria says must accompany religious renewal: Defending land, ceremony, and sovereignty against agencies, courts, and corporate extraction.

“Native” is often shorthand for Native American in US contexts, pointing to the first peoples of the continent. Deloria contrasts Native/tribal communal identity with Christianity’s invisible church, arguing that real religious life is anchored in identifiable communities, not disembodied doctrines.

The Trail of Broken Treaties was the 1972 national caravan that culminated in the occupation of BIA headquarters to demand redress for treaty violations. In Deloria’s telling, Wounded Knee (1973) symbolizes pan-tribal mobilization against the federal apparatus that had fractured communities and curtailed sacred practices.

A vision quest is a traditional rite of fasting and isolation at sacred places to receive power, songs, or guidance. Deloria notes how jets, highways, land closures, and court rulings (e.g., Lyng) make such quests nearly impossible, severing a core channel of religious authority and healing.

Watergate is the political scandal that Deloria invokes to expose the entanglement of American civil religion and conservative Christianity, e.g., Billy Graham’s praise of Nixon’s morality amid mounting corruption. Watergate exemplifies his broader critique that churches often bless state power while ignoring injustice to Indigenous peoples and the land.